Chaos in his Wake: Reedited Version
by SideshowStarlet
Summary: Six year-old Harry fought for fun, self-defense, and to become the warrior he always dreamed of being. Will a strange flyer with directions for joining "Project Mayhem" help him live his dream? Or will it destroy the light's greatest weapon? SpaceMonkeyHP
1. Chapter 1

**Space Monkey Harry!  
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**Deleted my old version of "Chaos in his Wake" and am posting a new, better version. I'll try to update as often as possible. Re-edited 3-8-2012  
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At six years old, Harry Potter could recite verbatim countless tales of ancient warriors fighting bravely in battle against remarkable odds. It is a truth, universally acknowledged, that every young boy (even Harry's moronic cousin Dudley) knew at least half a dozen such stories by heart. Whether these tales are told to them by their parents, seen on the telly, or read from a book, the result is the same. Every little boy, no matter how meek and mild-mannered, will at some point be inspired to get into a few fights of his own.

Despite, or perhaps because of, his young age and slender physique, Harry got into more fights than most. Between his aunt and uncle's version of discipline and Dudley's bullying and his schoolmates' roughhousing, Harry had perhaps been in more fights than some of the heroic figures in his stories.

At one point, he would stand meekly and allow himself to be beaten by his relatives, promising himself that he would behave better- like a good boy, like a _normal_ boy- to avoid feeling this pain again. It took Harry a few years to realize that there was nothing he could do to prevent himself from being attacked. However, fueled by his beloved stories of sword-fights, duels, and battles to the death, Harry began to defend himself against his attackers. At times, fighting back significantly decreased the physical pain that normally resulted from the altercation. A quick kick to the nuts often had his uncle shoving him into his cupboard while doubled over in pain rather than continuing to pummel his nephew for another fifteen minutes. Had Harry been more aware of his emotions, he would have found that even when he lost the fight against bigger, stronger opponents, he felt less emotional pain than he did back when he allowed himself to get beat up. After giving his opponent all he had, he felt a strange kind of satisfaction, knowing that he hadn't taken their crap laying down.

By the time he started school, Harry gloried in the thrill of the fight, whether he was fighting out of self-defense or just starting a fight for the fun of it or to work off the anxiety that came with being a friendless orphan with relatives who hated him. True, he did not always win his fights. He was weak and undernourished, fighting against much better-fed peers. However, he was agile and quick, possessing a dexterity honed from so many years of striving to do chores to his aunt's satisfaction. This allowed him to get in quite a few lucky hits. After years of being beaten, Harry knew which specific points to aim at in order to cause maximum pain.

Young Harry dreamed of being a warrior, but he knew a warrior had to be big and strong. He himself was short and skinny, the result of being underfed and living in a small cupboard. As such, he took care to never shirk from a fight, using every opportunity to strengthen his body and sharpen his reflexes.

* * *

><p>One wet, drizzly day during winter break, Harry lounged on his cot in the cupboard under the stairs, attempting to read the story of Hercules. The only sound in the house came from Aunt Petunia scrubbing all surfaces within reach, as Uncle Vernon was at work and Dudley was playing at a friend's house. Harry had no friends (none of the neighborhood mothers wanted her children playing with that violent nutjob Harry Potter), not that he wanted any. He would take a good book or a rousing fight over the opportunity to hang out with one of Dudley's cronies any day of the week. It would have been a peaceful, ordinary, perfectly normal day had Vernon not forgotten his lunch at home. Petunia glanced at the clock on the mantelpiece. If she hurried, she could bring her husband his lunch before he started getting hungry. Of course, she had to make extra arrangements for that awful Potter boy.<p>

A quick, unanswered phone call led to the conclusion that old Mrs. Figg, who usually babysat Harry, was not at home. So, her despised nephew would have to come with her. She only hoped that he didn't blow anything up or embarrass the family _too _much while they were in the building. It should be a quick trip, but Potter hardly needed any time at all to ruin something with his _freakishness,_ not to mention his propensity for violence. Ah, well, best to get it over with.

She unlocked her nephew's cupboard door and briskly ordered the boy to make himself presentable and to be ready in five minutes, no excuses. "Making himself presentable" meant covering up his injuries that he got from fighting with, well, everyone. Warriors were normally proud of their battle scars, as Harry understood it. They would show them off when they got home from battle, telling long, involved, often exaggerated, stories about how they got them. Harry himself had quite a few scars and bruises, which his aunt always insisted that he keep covered when he went into public. As an act of defiance, though, he never covered up the scar on his forehead. He was immensely proud of this scar, which was shaped like a bolt of lightning. It was his only injury which he did not know the origins of. His aunt and uncle tried to avoid looking at it, much less talking about it. If he wanted to go out with that particular injury uncovered, they would happily pretend it did not exist, provided he wasn't stupid enough to ask questions about it.

Harry quickly put on a turtleneck that was much too big for him and a pair of extremely baggy jeans, both hand-me-downs from his cousin Dudley, and hurried out into the living room. Aunt Petunia gave a disapproving sniff (her usual reaction to being presented with physical proof of Harry's existence) and cuffed the boy around the ear, warning him not to make trouble. Harry merely scowled.

* * *

><p>Petunia managed to beat the lunchtime rush into town and towards Grunning's, her husband's drill company. When she arrived in Vernon's office, she dutifully handed Vernon his lunch with a quick peck on the cheek. She was about to leave, dragging Harry quickly along with her before too many people spotted him and guessed that they were related, but her quick exit was interrupted by Vernon's secretary. "This yours, Mister Dursley?" She asked curtly, putting a piece of paper on Vernon's desk. "I found it in the copier."<p>

Vernon glanced at the paper, and his eyes widened in shock. He began reading the list, his lips moving silently as he scanned each line. His face turned red, then purple, with fury.

"No, this is not mine! Do I look like a nutcase to you?" Vernon screamed, his mustache quivering with indignation as his loud voice echoed across the office. Harry thought that his uncle looked somewhat less-than-sane, and, judging by the secretary's expression, she agreed with this assessment. Petunia looked curiously over her husband's shoulder to read what had gotten Vernon so upset. Her icy blue eyes narrowed and she pursed her lips, certain that her freakish nephew had something to do with this. Her well-manicured fingers dug deeply into Harry's shoulder, promising punishment when they got home. Harry stood on tiptoe, cocking his head to see what was on the paper that had gotten his aunt and uncle so angry, and what would result in a knock-down, drag-out fight when Aunt Petunia and Harry returned home. His determination to read more fighting stories combined with the fact that he was rarely allowed to watch TV and never told stories by his guardians had made him an advanced reader. He was able to scan the note before his uncle angrily crumbled it up and threw it in his wastebasket. The paper read:

_"Bringing the required items does not guarantee admission to training, but no applicant will be considered unless he arrives with the following items and exactly five-hundred pounds cash for personal burial money. This money must always be carried in the student's shoe so that if the student is ever killed, his death will not be a burden on Project Mayhem. In addition, the applicant has to arrive with the following:_

_Two black shirts_

_Two black pairs of trousers_

_One pair of heavy black shoes_

_Two pairs of black socks and two pairs of plain underwear_

_One heavy black coat_

_This includes the clothes the applicant has on his back._

_One white towel_

_One army surplus mattress_

_One white plastic mixing bowl"_

* * *

><p>Vernon continued to rant about lunatics, morons, and ineffective administrative assistants as the secretary edged her way out of the office. Petunia nodded along supportively as she mentally wrote out her grocery list... <em>must remember to pick up more crisps; we really run through those fast, don't we? Oh, yes and prunes.<em> Nobody noticed Harry swiftly ducking down to grab the discarded paper out of the wastebasket and slipping it into the roomy pocket of this jeans.

"It probably belongs to Crazy Old Jack," Vernon said, finally finishing his rant. "That man's a complete and utter lunatic. He has the office right across from mine, though not for long." Vernon grinned nastily. "Everyone knows he's going to be sacked soon. Good riddance, I say."

As Aunt Petunia dragged him by the hand out of his uncle's office and towards the exit, Harry risked a glance towards the office across from his uncle's. The door was open a crack, but he could not see anything out of the ordinary, merely a tired looking man doing something with his computer. The man certainly didn't look like crazy people looked on the telly. In fact, if Harry did not have more important things to do than start a fight with his aunt, he would venture to say that "Crazy Old Jack" looked more normal than Uncle Vernon did. True, he was a bit skinny, but that, in Harry's opinion, was better than being the size of a sumo wrestler who had been putting on weight during the off season. The man happened to glance out in the hallway, and Harry stifled a gasp when he saw Jack's face. It was covered with bruises, scrapes, and scars, giving the impression that the man had barely survived some sort of horrific battle. When Jack's eyes found Harry's, he gave the boy what could only be described as a cheeky grin. Aunt Petunia pulled impatiently at Harry's hand, tugging him along. Harry raised his other hand and gave Jack a very small wave.

* * *

><p>For reasons Harry did not fully understand, he was sent to his cupboard for a week when he and Aunt Petunia arrived home. Normally, he would have put up a fight, but today, his mind was elsewhere, focused on Project Mayhem. It sounded like a place where he could train to become a strong warrior. However, the note didn't have an address. Where was he supposed to report for training? He decided to make his way to Grunnings and hide out there until the man named Jack left. He could then follow Jack to wherever he went after work. If it was the same place Jack got all those injuries, Harry would know that he had found the right spot.<p>

Back in the real world, Harry's silence caused no amount of smugness from his aunt, who was convinced that her discipline technique was finally working and that she would have a perfectly docile nephew in no time. Little did she know that Harry was hatching a plan.

Harry tore through his messy cupboard, searching for the required supplies. He slipped on one of Dudley's old black shirts and a pair of worn-out black pants. He found another black shirt and pair of black pants and folded them up neatly in a clean corner of his cupboard. Harry then rolled up the ancient mattress that he had been using as a bed all his life and placed it in the same corner. The heavy black coat was harder to find, but Harry uncovered a box of moth-eaten old winter clothes. He found a heavy black coat that looked too big even for Dudley and which might have once fit Uncle Vernon back when he was more athletic.

He also found a pair of heavy black boots that had once belonged to Dudley. Dudley had never done anything that would require the use of such durable footwear; he had merely seen them in a sports store and demanded them because he thought they looked "Cool." As with most things that Dudley just had to have, his interest in the boots faded even before he had broken in the new shoes. Now, they were shoved into the box, forgotten, and stuffed into the cupboard under the stairs. They were still about two sizes too big for Harry, but he remedied this by crumbling up a few pieces of paper and wedging them into the toes of the boots. This way, he could walk, run, and fight in them without them falling off. They weren't very comfortable, but he would get used to that. Harry was certain that this Project Mayhem would make him a better fighter. That alone was worth any discomfort.

* * *

><p>Harry sat against the door of his cupboard, too anxious to even try to read the rest of the story he had started this morning. Instead, he merely stared at the bootlaces of his newly acquired shoes, trying to imagine what Project Mayhem would be like. Finally, he heard the sound he was waiting for: the front door opened and closed as Aunt Petunia left the house to pick up Dudley. Harry waited a minute in order to ensure that his aunt was too far away from the house to hear anything.<p>

* * *

><p><strong>Flashback<strong>

When Harry had just turned five, he had gone through a stage where all he could think about was karate. He would read all the books he could find about karate and spend every spare moment practicing the techniques. At first, he would practice punching and kicking the air. Then, he would incorporate these moves when he was defending himself. These techniques proved to be somewhat successful, but it was difficult to teach oneself how to fight using only library books and stolen glances at whatever action movies one's uncle and cousin happened to be watching. Harry realized that what he needed was a teacher.

That summer, he discovered a school of martial arts only a block away. However, this presented another problem. He needed money in order to enroll in a martial arts class, but there was no way that the Dursleys would ever spend money on him. They complained about how much Harry cost them to keep as it was, and that was with Harry wearing nothing but Dudley's old hand-me-downs, never being allowed to eat as much as he liked, never getting proper birthday presents, and sleeping in the cupboard under the stairs.

Harry had tried to do odd jobs around the neighborhood, but by this point, his reputation as a no-good delinquent had been set in stone. This reputation was due to a combination of Aunt Petunia's stories about Harry's no-good drunken parents who had died in a car crash, leaving Harry to be a burden on his hardworking, long-suffering relatives and Harry's frequent displays of violence. The fact that Harry always looked like a homeless person with his baggy, ragged-looking clothes and his constantly untidy hair did nothing to increase his employment opportunities in the superficial, appearance-obsessed neighborhood.

Therefore, Harry had been forced to earn the money through less than honorable means. He had learned to pick pockets, starting with the other children who walked around jingling with pocket change given to them by their parents. When he realized that the neighborhood children did not carry significant amounts of cash with them, he started stealing from the children's parents and any strangers he saw around the neighborhood. He was careful to steal only a few pounds at a time so that people would be less likely to notice the dip in their finances. However, he stole from multiple people everyday (making sure to pick different targets each day), so by the end of his "workday," the small sum added up.

Due to their close proximity, stupidity, and seemingly unlimited wealth, the Dursleys were a favorite target of Harry's sticky fingers. It was amazing how oblivious they could be. Harry could easily steal four or five pounds a day from each of them with Aunt Petunia, Uncle Vernon, and Dudley being none the wiser. By the end of the month, he had enough money to enroll in the karate class.

However, the school was not willing to teach him without permission from his parent or guardian. So, Harry took home an application form and spent hours in his cupboard, staring at it thoughtfully. He could read very well for his age, but had hardly ever attempted to write anything. At this point, he could barely write his own name legibly, which added to his relatives' opinion that he was mentally subnormal. He went to his uncle's study to borrow a pen and a copy of a document that contained the signatures of both his aunt and uncle. He had slipped the paper into the pocket of his oversized jeans and slipped downstairs to his cupboard.

He had spent the rest of that day hunched over that document, several unused pieces of Dudley's drawing paper, and the permission form. He began to practice writing out Aunt Petunia's and Uncle Vernon's full names as they were written on the document. He started by printing them, as he had at least a rudimentary of how to write print. It was a struggle to write neatly in a way that did not betray how much effort he put into writing each individual letter. It had to look like something an adult would write. That meant it had to be both casual, as if they wrote their names without difficulty everyday, and legible. When he finally felt that he had it down, he printed the names of his guardians in the indicated spaces on the permission form.

Then came the hard part. He carefully examined the loopy signatures written in the unfamiliar cursive writing. After several unsuccessful attempts on Dudley's drawing paper, Harry gave up making a signature that looked _exactly _like that of his aunt and uncle. It wasn't like the teachers will ever know the difference. He just had to make a few confident-seeming loops and swirls. He could make a few of the letters in cursive- the _P _in _Petunia_ and the _D_ and the _Y _in _Dursley_ for instance. He made sure to use different handwriting for both his aunt and uncle's names. Knowing that his nervousness would affect his handwriting, Harry took a few deep breaths before forging his aunt and uncle's signatures in the required blanks. Then, he returned the important-looking document to his uncle's study. After he was done with this, Harry settled into his the leather chair behind his uncle's desk and grabbed the phone and a notepad. He needed to make a few calls.

By this point, Dudley had been in the habit of making crank phone calls to strangers- calling up random numbers only to breathe loudly or ask a stupid question like "Is your refrigerator running?" Of course Harry was inevitably blamed when these numbers showed up on the Dursleys' phone bill. Harry had no problems with actually doing one of the stupid things his relatives were blaming on him for once. Harry remembered his aunt complaining that she couldn't telephone Ms. Number Seven because their phone got disconnected. Harry considered the fact that if one's phone was disconnected, it would be impossible to talk to that person on the phone a useful bit of knowledge for the fall, when he was set to start primary school. He was certain that teachers would be telephoning his relatives about his behavior, much like the neighbors did when they were too lazy to march up to Number Four Privet Drive and complain in person.

It looked like he would have to do his research sooner than he expected. Harry began to call random numbers from his uncle's phone. When someone picked up on the other end, Harry immediately hung up. Whenever he received the message that the number was disconnected, Harry carefully took note of that number. He continued until he had a list of five disconnected phone numbers. Then, considering his work done for the day, he slipped the notepad in his pocket and hurried back to his cupboard before his aunt caught him upstairs. Over the next few days, he made time everyday to call up those five numbers to ensure that they were still disconnected. Two weeks later, three of the five original numbers were still disconnected. Harry looked up the addresses which corresponded to these numbers and picked the residence which was closest to the martial arts school, not wanting to look suspicious by claiming an address that was too far away from the school. He then filled in the permission form with the fake address and phone number.

He turned in the permission form and the money with the excuse that both his aunt and uncle were working but had allowed him to walk to the school. And just like that, Harry was a student in the beginners' martial arts class.

Harry had applied all of his heart, body, mind, and soul to learning the new fighting style. He avidly drank in all of the Sensei's instructions and quickly mastered most of the techniques. However, not all aspects of the class came naturally to Harry. Occasionally, the Sensei would have a day in which he would not teach them how to fight, but merely have the pupils sit in a circle and talk about discipline. Despite how much Harry excelled at the physical aspects of karate, Harry could tell that his sensei was unhappy with his "lack of discipline." Apparently the Sensei was under the impression that being a good boy would keep him out of "unnecessary" fights. Well, that sure hadn't worked when he was younger, had it? Besides, what was the point in being _disciplined _enough to suffer something you didn't want or go without something you did want when you could simply fight for everything, as Harry was doing? The Sensei could keep his discipline as far as Harry was concerned. However, Harry managed to quietly tolerate the Sensei's strange insistence on peaceful conflict resolution and using violence only as a last resort since he was the guy who was teaching him all of these useful fighting techniques.

Things eventually came to a head when Harry managed to get into an altercation with one of his fellow students. He couldn't even remember what the fight was about. All he knew was that he loathed the boy, who reminded Harry of Dudley so much that Harry could not help wondering why the boy was voluntarily participating in an activity that required so much movement and didn't involve television. Harry had already been in a bad mood that day after his uncle had decided to blame him for the car breaking down and punished him accordingly. True, Harry had managed to get some good blows in before his uncle shoved him into his cupboard, but it was still an inconvenience to have to slip out of the cupboard, sneak past his relatives, and hurry to karate class. Then, when he got there, the annoying brat had to start riling him up. Harry felt that he could hardly be blamed for giving that twat the beatdown he deserved.

Of course, neither the Sensei nor the boy's parents were happy. Harry was kicked out of the class after refusing to apologize. The school tried to call his aunt and uncle to notify them of Harry's expulsion, but they found that the number provided by "Vernon and Petunia Dursley" was disconnected. Harry never went back to that school.

Although he could no longer come to class, Harry practiced what he learned from class alone in his cupboard and incorporated the techniques into the fights that he continued to get into. When these techniques proved to be successful, he wanted to move on to breaking boards of wood apart. He hadn't progressed this far in his karate classes before being kicked out, but he had been anxious to learn the skill. He had always been amazed when they did this trick in Dudley's movies. So, he practiced with scrap boards of wood in his uncle's rarely-used woodshop. At first, it was awkward and painful, particularly when he tried to break the boards with his bare feet. However, with continued practice, Harry found the same strange power that sometimes came to his aid in fights against larger opponents began to arise when he wanted to break apart boards of wood. He felt an indescribable warmth followed by a feeling of power. The board easily cracked in two. It wasn't long before all the planks were reduced to wood chips.

**End Flashback**

* * *

><p>Now, he was ready to put his hard-earned knowledge to good use.<p>

He raised one booted foot and kicked at the door of his cupboard. The wood shattered, and a hole large enough for Harry to walk through appeared. The hole was a lot bigger than the force of Harry's kick should warrant, but Harry didn't take the time to question this. He quickly stuffed the extra shirt, pants, and underwear and the rolled-up mattress into an ancient, moldy duffel bag that the Dursleys had stored in his cupboard. He hesitated a moment. Most of his possessions were either stolen or discarded items, but it hurt that he would never see any of this other stuff again: the storybooks and toy soldiers he had nicked from Dudley. Still, the hero had to put aside childish things in order to fulfill his destiny. At least, that's what happened in the stories he read.

With the bag slung over his shoulder, Harry jumped through the hole he had made in his cupboard door. With any luck, he would be long gone by the time Aunt Petunia came back and noticed the wood fragments from the cupboard door littering her otherwise immaculate living room. Then, he grinned. He would have plenty of time. Dudley never let his mum drive him anywhere without stopping to buy him a treat of some sort, whether it was a new video game or a burger and fries from the nearest fast-food restaurant. Still, he wanted to leave Privet Drive as soon as possible. He couldn't wait to put this place behind him.

Harry hurried to the kitchen and dug through one of the cupboards. He quickly found a white plastic mixing bowl and stuffed it into his duffel bag. Then, he hurried upstairs to Uncle Vernon's study, knowing from experience that this room would be the most likely place his uncle would keep cash. Sure enough, Harry found a stack of hundred pound notes hidden underneath some paperwork in the bottom drawer of Vernon's desk. He counted out 500 pounds and stuffed them in his right shoe. Then, he grabbed a few extra bills to use as cab fare and stuffed those in the pocket of his baggy jeans.

Harry rushed downstairs and ran out the back door without looking back.


	2. Chapter 2

**A/N : Sorry for the long wait, but I had a lot going on. I'm now officially a Registered Nurse with my first full-time job. Enjoy the story! Re-edited version of chapter three should be up soon. **

Harry pulled up the hood of his heavy black coat and stumbled down the wet and slippery walk in his too-large boots, doing his best to step lightly so that the heavy boots would not make so much noise. Though he hunched his shoulders and crossed his arms over his thin chest, as if trying to reduce the amount of space he took up, he kept his head up, peering around at the familiar surroundings as if expecting someone to jump out and tackle him to the ground. Or worse, drag him back to Number Four. The overall effect was that of a turtle walking on its hind legs: his slouched posture, along with the heavy black coat covering his chest, torso, and most of his legs made an odd sort of shell which covered most of Harry's small body. His head stuck out oddly from his balled-up body, looking oddly dwarfed by the heavy, baggy clothes beneath it, twisting and turning wildly in an attempt to view all of his surroundings at once.

Fortunately for Harry's escape mission, the unpleasant weather meant that few people were willing to brave the outdoors. The few who were outside had ventured out on an important errand and were trying to make their way indoors as quickly as possible. They barely gave their surroundings a second glance. Even if they had noticed the small boy lurching his way down the walk, they would not have the time to give him more than a passing glance, much less investigate why the child was outside alone dressed like a homeless person.

In contrast to his neighbors' complacency, Harry's green eyes darted around, scanning for potential attackers. This wasn't because he was afraid. It was simply a necessary and well-practiced skill from spending the majority of his childhood in the seemingly peaceful suburbs of Little Whinging.

When Harry felt he was far enough away from Privet Drive, he hailed a taxi and gave the driver the address to Grunnings. A questioning eyebrow-raise from the driver caused Harry to explain innocently, "I'm visiting my uncle at work."

The driver seemed to accept this explanation, as he didn't comment, merely drove silently to the requested destination. Or at least, he started to.

About halfway to their destination, the taxi slammed into a car speeding down their lane in the opposite direction. The cab driver tried to careen out of the crazy motorist's path, but he wasn't fast enough. The car slammed into the taxi, throwing the insane driver through his own windshield and onto the dashboard of the cab.

The taxi driver slammed on the brakes, which only caused the injured man to roll down the hood until his body pressed against the front window of the cab. For a split second, the only sound was the squeal of the brakes and the sound of the windshield cracking as the man's body slammed into it. Both the driver and Harry, it seemed, were struck dumb. Then their vocal cords started working again, and Harry screamed as the taxi-driver let out a few swear words that would make Uncle Vernon blush.

Harry tilted his head to peer around the cab driver's head at the injured man. The man's face was bloody, his nose looked broken, and there were shards of glass stuck in his cheek. What remained of the man's face was currently pressed up against what remained of the taxi's windshield, as if the man had merely been pressing his face up against the glass to look through the window. Despite the pain the man had to be in, he was grinning. A manic jack-o-lantern grin with missing teeth and a strange glint in his eyes, but grinning nonetheless.

The cab driver rushed out to check on the man, calling an ambulance on his cell phone as he went. Harry hesitated for a second, then followed the driver. When he stepped out of the car, Harry could swear he heard the man yelling something about having a "Near life experience," voice muffled against the window.

Used to receiving numerous injuries at the hands of the Dursleys, Harry had a basic working knowledge of first aid. While the cab driver was preoccupied calling for paramedics, Harry came closer to the man and gingerly pulled out all the bits of glass he could see. Of course, this only made the cuts deeper. The man let out several pained moans. Harry quickly found the cut that was losing the most blood and pinched the cut firmly so that the edges of non-injured skin on each side of the wound made contact.

Concentrating as hard as he could, Harry soon felt his mysterious power flow through him just as it always did when he was repairing boards of wood. Soon, the edges of the cut joined together, leaving a thin layer of delicate pink skin where the cut had been. It wasn't exactly as good as new, but at least that cut had stopped bleeding. Knowing the man was losing blood quickly, Harry moved onto the next cut without hesitation. He didn't stop until all the cuts on the man's face were healed. He glanced up to see that the crowd that had gathered at the scene was watching him in silent disbelief. _So much for staying inconspicuous._

Harry panicked when he heard the tinny whine of an ambulance coming closer. He knew that the ambulance would take the man to the hospital, and the young boy had heard enough about hospitals to both hate and fear them. As far back as he could remember, the Dursleys had threatened him with the unseen horrors of going to the hospital. Uncle Vernon may have been more physically intimidating, but it was Aunt Petunia who truly had a way with words. She could string threats together as easily as an experienced jeweler could string pasta together to make a macaroni necklace. She painted a grim picture of Harry's bad behavior, whether real or imaginary, pushing his loving guardians too far and causing him to wind up in a cold, dark room visited only by adults in white coats who stuck needles everywhere in his body, made him bleed for the sole purpose of collecting his blood in test tubes, and, when he was being really naughty, put him to sleep so that they could cut him open and fix him. Sometimes, she warned, children who forced the grownups to resort to this did not ever wake up.

One of the main reasons that he had become so adept at taking care of himself was his fear of ending up in the hospital. That was where people went to die. He knew in his six year-old heart that once you went in the hospital, you never came out. Looking at the dark-haired man still sprawled across the dashboard of the taxi, Harry felt a connection that he couldn't possibly explain. He'd be damned if he was letting this man disappear.

Harry extended a hand and helped the man pull himself off the car and onto the street. Together, they fought their way through the shocked crowds (the man employing both elbows and Harry kicking the male onlookers in their unmentionables until the mob parted like the Red Sea). Then, he and the man ran away from the group of curious and frightened people until they could no longer hear the panicked shouts nor the sound of the ambulance. Harry wasn't sure where they were going, but thanks to the man's still-injured legs and Harry's speed (even encumbered by the heavy uniform of Project Mayhem), the boy easily kept up with the strange man, who seemed to know exactly where he was going. They didn't stop until they were in front of a pub located in a less crowded area of town.

As they both paused to catch their breaths, the man gazed at Harry as though seeing him for the first time. The gaze turned calculating before the man nodded to himself, as though settling something in his mind. He then put his arm around Harry's shoulders and steered him into the pub, saying something about "Taking the edge off."

Ten minutes later, Harry found that this man didn't "Take the edge off" the same way as Uncle Vernon. Uncle Vernon normally kicked back with a couple of beers and watched football on the big screen TV that Harry was forbidden to touch. The strange man liked to take the edge off by meeting in the basement of the pub and beating the crap out of other guys. Harry liked this man better already.

It took half an hour for the man to win his first fight, and when he did, his cuts had opened up again, and three more teeth popped out. The man picked his teeth up off the ground, as if he did this everyday, then made his way over to Harry, whistling through the new gaps in his mouth.

He knelt in front of Harry and gave him a questioning look. Without hesitating, Harry patched up the man's cuts the same way he had after the car accident. Then he took the teeth from the man's hands and told him to open his mouth. Harry had never tried putting teeth back in before. On the rare occasion that Uncle Vernon or Dudley managed to punch out a tooth, Harry didn't bother trying to put them back in, figuring that as baby teeth, they were going to fall out eventually anyway.

However, with the man whom he- for reasons he couldn't explain, so wanted to impress- watching him expectantly, Harry acted like he did this every day and pushed the first tooth back into its gap. He held it there with his thumb for almost a full minute before he hesitantly pulled his hand away. The tooth stayed in. Harry tried wiggling it experimentally. It didn't budge. Growing more confident, Harry put the other two teeth back in the same way.

Harry knew next to nothing about medicine and the human body. All he knew was that for whatever reason, he could fix traumatic injuries the same way he cut put together two pieces of wood. It took him longer and seemed to require greater concentration, but he could do it. Of course, putting the pieces back together didn't always guarantee that he was completely healed. Generally, cuts that he managed to close back together left scars. Other times, dirt from his hands managed to get trapped in the injury before Harry pieced it back together, causing it to become what Aunt Petunia called "infected" and causing her to rub Hydrogen Peroxide on the injury. Harry wasn't certain whether this was supposed to help or if this was another way for his aunt to punish him. All he knew was that it hurt like a bitch.

After Harry healed the man's face to the best of his ability, he realized that the man looked strangely familiar. He suddenly realized why the man looked so familiar to him. _"You! You're Crazy Old Jack!" _Harry gasped.

The man raised an eyebrow. "You work at Grunnings," Harry continued. "You're the one who left that Project Mayhem flyer in the copy machine."

"Possibly," the man conceded after a long pause, not seeming surprised that a child had access to copies of documents he had made at work. _He must be the man who waved to me, then. Anyone else would have asked how I knew about the paper, wouldn't they? _

"I want to join Project Mayhem," said Harry bluntly.

The man gave him a long, calculating look. "Let's see how you fight first," he said, gesturing to the center of the ring. "Challenge somebody."

Harry didn't hesitate before pulling the startled man into the center of the ring and raising his fists, ready to prove himself.


	3. Chapter 3

Harry grabbed Crazy Old Jack's hand and hurried him to the middle of the ring excitedly, like a child eager to show his father something. The crowds parted for the new fighters, then did a double take to see their leader about to fight a six year-old boy. The two stood facing each other in the middle of a mob of curious watchers, some excited, some worried, some a little tipsy.

Jack smirked at Harry, cocking his eyebrow in a subtle invitation to begin. Unlike the people Harry was used to fighting with, Jack allowed Harry to make the first move. In some of the old stories Harry read, allowing the enemy to make the first move was portrayed as a noble thing to do. Of course, this also gave the fighter an extra opportunity to assess their enemy's fighting skill or lack thereof. Jack didn't seem like anyone's idea of a noble fighter or a white knight. Harry was sure that the man was doing this to test him, feel him out, search for weakness. Well, despite Harry's young age and small size, Jack wouldn't find any weakness in _him._

Harry began the match with a hard kick, a kick that could split a board of wood like it was nothing, to Jack's shin. Immediately, Jack retaliated with a series of quick punches to Harry's gut, knocking the wind out of him. Used to the pain, Harry didn't let it get in the way of punching, kicking, and biting every part of Jack that he could reach.

When Jack slumped over in pain, still refusing to give up the fight, Harry took the opportunity to reach the taller man's face and scratch at Jack's newly healed wounds. The fragile new skin broke easily, and Jack's face was soon bleeding just as it had immediately after the car crash. Jack instinctively grabbed Harry's wrists, his fingers easily circling the bony arms. He easily lifted the small boy. Jack held him at arm's length so that Harry's frantic kicks met only thin air. He smirked, meeting the boy's eyes for an instant before lifting Harry as high as he could reach, intending to throw the boy to the cement floor.

It was in that moment that _it _happened. Nobody knew exactly what _it _was, not even Harry, who, during his time at the Dursleys, had often been blamed for causing _it. It _wasn't really a specific event; just something strange that, had the neighbors been watching, would cause them to take a second look (much to Aunt Petunia's horror).

In this particular case, _it _referred to the mysterious, irresistible force that caused Jack to drop Harry as if the child had somehow managed to burn the man's hands. That wasn't all, though. As soon as Jack let go of Harry, he held his hands against his chest and crouched down, moaning in pain. Harry, used to being thrown hither and thither by his hot-tempered uncle, easily landed on his feet. A swift kick to the distracted Jack's head sent the man onto his back. Jack laid spread-eagle, eyes wide with shock, staring up at his victor.

Harry had experienced something similar to this with Uncle Vernon, had felt the same unexplainable force work through him. He had been four years old, and his uncle had a grip on his neck with one hand, while raising a large meaty fist inches from Harry's face. Harry had felt a strange, tingling sensation that began in the pit of his stomach and extended outwards throughout the rest of his body. In seconds, every part of his body pulsed with this strange sensation. At this point, the bewildered Vernon Dursley felt himself being thrown against the wall. He recovered quickly, though, and was on his feet before Harry had a chance to process what happened. Vernon sentenced Harry to three weeks in his cupboard for _"creating freakishness in a perfectly normal house!" _

Harry had grown up with the idea that strange things happened around him, but that had been the first time he considered the possibility that _he _was the one causing them. He spent the next few years trying to repeat the experience, allowing the indescribable power to flow through him. With practice, he could call this power to him more easily. However, he was not always successful at summoning this power, and, when it did come, it did not do all the work for him. He still had to do some pretty strong punching and kicking in order to weaken his opponent to the point where they could be defeated by that burst of energy.

The crowd in the basement stood in shocked silence for a moment, then a few of the men, appreciating a good fight and more than a few good drinks, let out a loud cheer. Grinning modestly, Harry bent down to help Jack to his feet. Laughing drunkenly from the adrenaline from the fight, they walked off hand-in-hand to a relatively quiet corner of the crowded basement.

Jack sat down on the dingy basement floor and leaned his head back against the wall. Harry imitated him, his hand still in Jack's. Noticing the fresh scars across the man's face and arms, Harry made to heal the wounds. However, Jack waved him off, stating that he wanted to keep his scars. Harry could relate to this. He did like the idea of having a multitude of scars, like a warrior who had fought bravely in some horrific battle. A really strong man, Harry figured, would walk around with scars littering his body and not even care. He would neither try to hide them or try to show them off, just stop the bleeding, keep them clean, and go about his business. Seeing the relaxed grin that made its way across Jack's scarred face, squeezing out more blood, Harry felt his respect for his would-be teacher rise.

"So, am I in Project Mayhem yet?" Harry asked.

"If you can get through the initiation," he responded. "C'mon."

And he pulled Harry to his feet and led him out of the pub, down a dingy sidewalk towards a bus stop. The other passengers (mostly people on their way home from an exhausting day at a job that paid too little and was slowly killing them, as no tourists actually came into this area) stared at the man and the boy as they made their way to the back of the bus, still hand-in-hand. Jack was still smirking about something that only made sense to him, and both were covered in cuts and bruises, as if they had just been in a fight.

Jack and Harry settled into the bench-like seat at the back of the bus, where they could have more space and privacy. Jack put his arm around Harry's slender shoulders, then bent down to pick up a discarded newspaper from that morning. Harry leaned against Jack and listened as the man flipped through the paper and quietly read out the various headlines inside.

'_Vintage Vehicles Vandalized at Car Show_,'

'_An Explosion of Explosions in London: Record Cases of Arson this Month_,' and

_'Statues Decapitated'_

Harry furrowed his brows. Was Jack having him on? He himself occasionally tried to read his uncle's newspaper, but the stories in there were all boring, usually about business, finances, and who was running for office. The stories Jack read didn't seem like the kinds of things that showed up in a real newspaper. However, a quick look at the paper confirmed that Jack had been stating the actual headlines. His breath caught as he noticed that Jack was absorbed in an article headlined '_Police Investigating Underground Fight Clubs_.'

Was Jack in danger of going to jail? Was he? His aunt and uncle had always told him that he would wind up there eventually, but he and Jack really weren't doing anything wrong. All they had done was beat the crap out of each other for the fun of it. Most of the people he had left behind on Privet Drive did that kind of stuff all the time, except the people they went after did not want to be in a fight. So, really, this Fight Club was better than the respectability he had run away from.

Harry's musings were interrupted when the bus came to a stop. Jack pulled him off and walked him towards a dilapidated three-story house that seemed to be out in the middle of nowhere. The man explained Harry's initiation as he led the boy up the front walk. "Stay on the front porch for three days, no matter what, and you're in. We're not giving you food, water, or encouragement, so if you want to be a part of Project Mayhem, you'll have to suck it up."

Harry nodded in understanding. He could do this. He had read about warriors going through more heinous initiations and had experienced longer periods of hunger and thirst at the Dursleys.

Jack led him over to the house's front porch, where a young man with platinum blond hair was already standing, toes against the front step. "You're too fucking pretty for this, Mister Angel-Face," Jack snapped, giving the blond man a swift punch in the gut. "Now get the Hell out of here." The newly-christened Angelface didn't move. He merely stood doubled over, watching Jack warily, should he decide to strike again.

Then, Jack turned to Harry. "Sorry, kid, you're too young. Now get back home; it's almost dinnertime, and your mother's tits are full."

Harry didn't move, not even when Jack slapped him round the head. Jack must have caught on to the fact that neither of his visitors would be leaving anytime soon, as he went into the house, slamming the door behind him.

**Woot. Next chapter: Harry's three days on the porch. I hope you are enjoying the story so far.**


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